A Study Of Structure And Meaning Of The Sacrificial Verbs In Shang Oracle Bone Inscriptions

The Shang oracle bone inscriptions are the earliest systematic written characters that have survived till today as the historic records of the late Shang Dynasty. They are also the uncovered earliest origin of China's language, history and culture. By studying the sacrificial language in the oracle bone inscriptions, we can see relatively nore truly the situation of the society at the time. And to study the language, it would be the best way to start with its verbs, which are in large numbers and have their own characteristics. The study of the sacrificial verbs and their related noun phrases, prepositional phrases, and adverbial phrases can help us more comprehensively understand the features of the Shang language. This study is significant not only for the research on the linguistic changes of the late Shang, but also for our study of the Bronze inscriptions of the lestern Zhou and the ancient writings of the Spring-Autumn period. It will also provide direct materials for a deeper and broader study of the history of the Chinese language. Moreover, it can uncover first-hand information for our study of the sacrificial system and religious thinking of the late Shang. Currently the study is relatively weak, and no scholar has made a comprehensive, systematic, qualitative and quantitative study of the sacrificial verbs in oracle bone inscriptions. This dissertation based on the achievements by previous scholars is a comprehensive study of the sacrificial verbs and carries out a deep research on the form and meaning of those verbs according to the principle of combining grammatical structure with senntic analysis.First, this dissertation determines the number of the sacrificial verbs, and, following the principle of combining grammatical structure with semantic analysis, classifies the verbs into four groups. The verbs of Group A can take the object of cause, but not the sacrifice as their object of patient. Groups B, C, and D can not take the object of cause, but can all take the object of beneficiary. Group B can take the object of sacrifice, whereas Group C can not. And Group D verbs follow the association principle of similar position implying similar words and only appear in the Wang-bin structure and can not take the object of beneficiary or sacrifice. Next, this study defines and classifies the verb-object structures. Single verbs can take one, two, or three objects. The meanings of the objects can be cause, beneficiary, patient (sacrifice), tool, location, etc. Oracle bone inscriptions differ from later literature in that, while the two-object structures with a non-sacrificial verb have survived in modern Chinese as the Ji-yu structure, the two-object structures with a sacrificial verb have the meaning of any two out of the three items: (tor some cause), (to somebody), and (use some sacrifice). Moreover, the object-taking ability is different with different groups of verbs. Even verbsfrom the same group may show difference in taking the same kind of object, hence the large difference between the numbers of two-object and three-object structures. This study also attempts to explain the reason for this phenomenon.This study then classifies and analyzes the preverbal adverbial phrases and the post-verbal compleaent phrases. The adverbial phrases before the verb can indicate beneficiary, cause, time, location, or agent, while the post-verbal complements can only indicate beneficiary, time, and location. The structures with more than one adverbial or post-verbal complement are also studied. In general, the phrase of tine is always located relatively far froa the verb, with the beneficiary relatively near the verb, and the cause immediately after the verb.The study goes on to analyze the semantic relations between the verb and its arguments, which are noun phrases and prepositional phrases that have certain semantic relations with the verb. We mainly discuss six types of argument: cause, beneficiary, sacrifice, time, location, and agent, and illustrate their form and their position relative to each other. To support o...